


keep the wolves away

by getmean



Series: you look to yours and i will look to mine [1]
Category: The Pacific (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Western, Introspection, M/M, Pining, Secrets, Set in a very funny timeless pocket dimension because i'm a fake historian i suppose, eugene is a rancher and snafu is a no good cowboy, tension both sexual and otherwise
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-08-21
Updated: 2018-08-21
Packaged: 2019-06-30 16:53:13
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 9,360
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15755874
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/getmean/pseuds/getmean
Summary: The night had fallen quickly, and the wide expanse of country around his ranch has shrank to a pinprick, just the circle of flickering light from the gaslamp above his shoulder, the suggestion of the mountains looming in the distance.It’s so still that Eugene hears the pounding of horses hooves long before he spots the horse itself, a shadow amongst shadows.





	keep the wolves away

**Author's Note:**

> written for the western au prompt for sledgefu week! writing this i realised that actually i have no idea how the west operated once they got over settling out there every few months and dying - so this is a little made up. forgive the historical inaccuracies, suspend disbelief, it's all fanservice ahead.

It’s the watery grey light of dawn that makes Eugene stir, long before the dog would normally start nosing at his face for her breakfast. She’s still asleep, lying on her back at the foot of Eugene’s bed, who takes the opportunity to groan, cover his face with his hands. No one ever gets used to the early early mornings, he’s pretty convinced of that. Rising before the sun isn’t programmed into anyone’s body, or at least not into his. 

It’s a Sunday, an easy day. Church, and then the rest of the day is dedicated to checking on the herd-health, which means Sally gets a run around and his horse gets to stretch her legs a little. Eugene allows himself a few moments more of savouring his bed before he rolls out of it to shower, eat, dress. 

The water’s running cold, which means he’ll have to go have a calculated bang on the top of the boiler later, but the day is beginning to warm up already so it’s no great pain. He already knows he’ll be sweating through his shirt in church soon enough, but it’s best to not get into ranch work clean anyway.

He fills Sally’s bowl, gives her a pat on the top of her sweet mutt head, and then goes out to start his day. It’s routine, it’s peaceful to the point of boring, but it suits him just fine. Church goes slow; he keeps his head bowed and his eyes on his feet and doesn’t spare a moment pondering his sins. He is watched everywhere, he knows that, but in no place more than amongst these pews. He prays, says his ‘amens’, and when it is over Eugene puts his hat back on and has a covert cigarette in his truck. The day is heating up, the sun high at the apex of the sky, blistering. The cicadas are screaming bloody murder, and as he pulls out of the church yard in a cloud of dust he imagines they’re screaming for water just as the rest of the country is. 

It hasn’t rained in weeks, and Eugene can only thank God that he went into the cattle business over farming, otherwise he’d be even worse off in this drought. It’s bad enough as it is, no need to bring crop yields into the mess. 

Sally is out front to greet him as he rolls up to the ranch, jumping all up on his legs as he kicks off his dusty church shoes by the door. “Hey girl.” He murmurs, and gives her a scratch behind her ear. Her tongue lolls from her mouth, overexcited, and he grins back at her. “Now don’t you go messin’ with the cattle today, baby.”

She messes with the cattle, of course, but Eugene is sat up too high on the horse to really notice her, or to scold her properly. To be out in the pastures on horseback is a welcome relief after the morning in church, something that is becoming more chore than salvation. Eugene tips his head back, breathing in the fresh air, the smell of hay, and cows, and hot dirt and manure. Real smells, ground-level smells, not the incense and the cold dust of church. His eyes scan his herd, the brown backs of cattle reaching as far as he can see, the great flat plains of Montana going on and on and up into the sky, the Rockys clawing jagged into the expanse of blue. His pew is the saddle, and he’s becoming more and more comfortable with that every day. “Like God ain’t sittin’ out here waitin’ for us to stop wastin’ our time in some stuffy chapel.” He mutters to himself, and turns his eyes away from the horizon, towards his herd, towards home. With a flick of the reigns he’s off, the afternoon sun touching hot on his shoulders and his back. Sally follows, pleased, her mouth hanging open as she lopes along.

Eugene doesn’t shower again: the only thing in his near future is a cold beer on the front porch, and maybe some of that bread he baked the other night, that butter from the farm a few miles over. His thighs ache from being in the saddle, and his neck is hot with sunburn, across his nose too. He ignores it all, shucking off his boots, stripping down to his undershirt and his jeans so as to catch the last rays of late evening sunlight unrestricted. 

“Easy.” He murmurs, nudging the dog with his foot as she spins excited circles around his feet at the sight of food. “Not for you, girl.”

He supposes it may be a lonely life, just him and his dog, the cattle and the wide open wilderness. He likes it just like that. His father had owned the ranch before him, his grandfather before that. Eugene wouldn’t be able to give it up any easier than giving up his own hands. He takes a seat on the creaky porch bench, laying his cigarettes, his matches down on the arm next to his beer. He was born here. He would die here. 

Right now, he is having a beer here. 

The night begins flooding in early, as August evenings are wont to do, the sky fading indigo as Eugene set about lighting the lamps inside the house, the one on the porch. He has another beer, the night too nice to retire to bed already. A warm, clear night, so still that Eugene can hear the cattle lowing from afar. It mingles with the buzzing of the grasshoppers, the breeze through the dry, dead grass. Maybe it was the three or so beers Eugene had had, but he’s drowsy, dreamy under the press of his nostalgia for this place. Above the porch roof, as far as the eye can see, the sky stretched out starlit and vast, humbling. The night had fallen quickly, and the wide expanse of country around his ranch has shrank to a pinprick, just the circle of flickering light from the gaslamp above his shoulder, the suggestion of the mountains looming in the distance.

It’s so still that Eugene hears the pounding of horses hooves long before he spots the horse itself, a shadow amongst shadows. Sally perks up, suddenly serious, alert. “You see it too, huh?” Eugene breathes, watching as the horse makes what is an unmistakable beeline for Eugene’s ranch. As it comes closer, he can see a rider, hunched on its back. He stands, flicking away the butt of his cigarette in an arc of embers as the horse and its rider slow at the entrance of his ranch. 

Eugene is a wary man, but he’s also a religious man, and it doesn’t make sense to him why anybody would be riding their horse that hard after nightfall like that unless they are either hurt, or bad news. For him, the concern that they might be hurt outweighs his fear of the unknown - perhaps he’s naïve, or far too trusting, or just plain stupid, but he waves the rider forward into his pocket of light. 

When the rider dismounts, Eugene can see he’s a man, perhaps a head shorter than him. He’s hunched awkwardly, as though his side hurts him, a faint limp to his step that he’s obviously trying to hide, or shake off. Eugene doesn’t let his guard down, doesn’t step off his porch into the darkness. 

“What d’you want?” He calls, and the man waves a hand, head ducked low.

“I got beat.” He calls back, finally half-limping into the wavering light of the gaslamp, and turning his face up so Eugene can see him fully. He isn’t lying: his curls are slicked down and sticking to his face with what looked like sweat and blood, black in the low light. The source of it all seems to be a wound above his eye, which is purpling and swelling into quite the shiner. Eugene’s nerves spike: between the holster and gun at his hip and his beaten face, he looks like nothing but trouble. “I just gotta lay low.” He continues, and he has a molasses slow accent that drips with the South, a bayou twang. Eugene tears his eyes from his holster, and deadly shine of his pistol, and forces himself to take in the man’s bloodied face again. 

“Ain’t often we get strangers around here.” Eugene says, and Sally has been growling behind him the whole time, hackles raised. The man looks young, Eugene’s age or even younger; a devilish, impish face beyond all the blood. All sharp corners and huge features, and those big, pale green eyes peering from the drying blood are eerie, hypnotising. Behind the man, his horse is still breathing heavy, a white lather around its mouth. “How hard d’you ride that thing?” Eugene adds, gesturing to the horse, and the man doesn’t even glance from Eugene’s face, those unsettling eyes like lamplight in the darkness.

“Name’s Shelton.” He murmurs, “What’s yours?”

“Eugene.” He keeps his voice hard, even though the man is beginning to break down his barriers a little. He’s so obviously hurt that Eugene knows he can’t turn him away, and those _eyes_ -

“Gene,” Shelton says, and a smile begins to creep onto his face. It’s all teeth. “Now we ain’t strangers.”

There’s a beat of silence, in which Eugene struggles to come up with any kind of reply to that. The man - Shelton - waits, silent, eyes trained on Eugene’s face. He doesn’t seem to mind Sally’s growling, or the blood dripping steadily onto the collar of his washed out denim shirt. His hand is pressed to his side, fingers dug into the skin so hard his knuckles are white, and that is what tips Eugene over into a decision. 

“Come inside.” He murmurs, stepping aside to let Shelton pass him up the steps. “Leave your pistol out here.”

Eugene’s never had trouble at his ranch, and he’s not about to start. He watches Shelton tramp past him, the spurs on his boots jangling with every step he takes. Closer, he can smell the sweat on him, acrid fear-sweat and blood. It makes him feel a little better inviting this stranger into his home, in some odd way. There’s no way to fake the stink of fear. 

“Can I get a glass ‘a water?” Shelton asks, as soon as he’s over the threshold. His gaze is darting around Eugene’s kitchen, hands twitching at his now-empty belt. He looks larger than life in Eugene’s warmly-lit, cosy little kitchen. It’s the bruising on his face, even more than Eugene first realised now that he’s under some lights, the odd, frantic energy to him. Like a spring wound too tight.

“What happened to you?” Eugene asks, crossing to the sink to pour Shelton the water. When he hands it off to him, he notices that he’s shaking. “Take a seat.” Shelton glances at Sally, who’s still unhappy about his presence, sulking under the table. “She don’t bite.”

Shelton eases himself into a chair at the kitchen table, and drinks heavily from his glass before replying, a hand to his mouth to wipe the water away. “Got jumped a mile outta town. Got a few good swings in on ‘em but they took all my money and ran.” He brings the glass to his lips again, and shakes his head. “Didn’t even get to see their faces it was so dark.”

Eugene leans back against the sink, giving Shelton a long, considering look. The story didn’t quite make sense: why would the men who robbed him not take his horse? His boots? His _pistol?_ But, he has been beaten, there was no way a person can lie about that, so Eugene decides to take him at face value for now. “You hurtin’?” He asks, and Shelton drops his head back and groans.

“They got me hard in the ribs.” He mutters, and Eugene has to tear his eyes away from the line of his throat, the way he sits knees spread and easy in Eugene’s chair. If he had thought that Shelton had looked devilish in the sputtering lamplight of the porch, that was nothing to how he looks in Eugene’s home. Like he was made to disrupt that borderline boring peace that Eugene has been wearing a groove into for twenty years. 

“Lemme take care of that head wound for you.” Eugene says, not moving from his place at the sink. He feels frozen in place, unable to reconcile the appearance of this stranger in his home. Was this not just a normal, quiet Sunday?

“Is it that bad?” He asks, and brings his fingers to touch it, and then draws them away immediately with a wince. He stares at the blood on his hand, as though he wasn’t quite expecting it. “Huh.”

“It’s that bad.” Eugene deadpans, and takes the chance of leaving Shelton alone in his kitchen as he crosses through to the bathroom to grab his medicine box. “And that eye needs some ice, too.” He calls, yanking open the cupboard under the sink in search for it. It’s shoved away at the back, streaks of orange rust through the metal, but when Eugene cracks it open it’s all there.

“I feel like my whole body needs some ice.” Shelton groans, turning to watch Eugene as he sets the box on the table, and drags a chair closer so he can sit. “Can I smoke?”

“Do want you want.” Eugene murmurs, flipping the lid of the box to dig around for rubbing alcohol, cotton wool. Shelton digs a pack of Camels from his shirt pocket, fusses around for matches long enough that Eugene hands him his own.

“Thanks.” Shelton says, rueful and muffled around his cigarette. He glances up, catching Eugene’s gaze, and God, _those eyes_. Eugene is a deer in the headlights under them. Through all that blood and all that bruising…it’s the colour against his olive skin, that bluegreengrey, and Eugene can’t tear his eyes away. Silence floods between them, the beat of the fan and the hum of the refrigerator the only things tethering Eugene to his home. 

Shelton drops his gaze, and the spell is broken. Eugene feels as though some invisible string has been cut, and he clears his throat, busies himself with the rubbing alcohol, the cotton. Shelton lights his cigarette, and the smell of smoke is enough to relax Eugene’s muscles, put him at ease.

“So you ain’t from ‘round here.” He says, taking the first dab of the soaked cotton to Shelton’s poor face. Shelton flinches a little, those huge eyes cast down as he grimaces.

“How’d ya tell?” He asks, that Southern drawl, and Eugene chuckles.

“Just answered it for me.” He replies, frowning as he wipes at the dried blood in Shelton’s eyebrow. “Rare we get someone who sounds like that up around these parts.”

“Don’t blame ‘em, with the reception I got.” Shelton snarks, and Eugene snorts.

“Don’t tar us all with the same brush.” Then, “This shirt is ruined.”

“Only one I got.” Shelton replies, and his voice is tired, bone tired. Eugene lapses into silence, concentrating on cleaning the wound in his head as best he can as Shelton smokes and tilts his head this way and that for Eugene. It’s very intimate; Eugene can smell the salt on his skin, could count the pale freckles that scatter Shelton’s face if he wanted. When Eugene touches his fingers to Shelton’s jaw, he tenses, eyes flicking down to Eugene’s with an unreadable expression on his face. Fear? No. Something closer to wariness. 

“Just need your chin up.” Eugene murmurs, and Shelton needles him with a long, searching look before he slowly tips his face to the ceiling. 

It’s the proximity to Shelton’s face, Eugene’s hand on his shoulder, his face, smelling his sweat and blood, that gets Eugene thinking a little crazy. There’s an undeniable magnetism about the man, a mysteriousness that Eugene is sure is a wall about his being. He thinks if he knew Shelton for a hundred years he wouldn’t be able to put his finger on what makes him so hypnotic. Maybe it’s the late hour, the strangeness of having someone in his home, a place normally reserved for him and the dog and nobody else. Under all that blood and bruising, Shelton is handsome, and Eugene isn’t sure why he can’t stop noticing the fact. His face feels hot, hotter when Shelton glances up at him from under his lashes and drawls, “You done?”

“Best I can do without a shower.” Eugene says, half in a daze as he scoots his chair back. “I mean, _you_ in the shower, not. Uh, I’m-” He’s flustered, and he knows Shelton can tell because he’s smirking now, and goddamn if that smirk doesn’t do something to the pit of Eugene’s stomach. “Not me. In the shower.”

“Sure.” Shelton murmurs, amusement thick in his voice. 

Eugene tidies up in silence, and when he comes back into the kitchen, Sally has her head on Shelton’s knee. _Traitor_ , Eugene thinks, before he can hold it back. They both perk their heads up when he appears in the doorway to the kitchen, and the scene is so surreal that he has to bite back on a laugh.

“Sweet dog.” Shelton comments, and Eugene blurts:

“Stay the night. Rest up.” 

It’s out of his mouth before he can really think about it, but it makes the most sense. What is he gonna do, send Shelton out into the night to be robbed again? Or worse? The floor creaks under his feet as he crosses to the other side of the kitchen, beckoning Shelton as he passes him. “This room ain’t ever used.” He says, opening the door enough so the light from the kitchen washes in. He doesn’t tell Shelton it used to be his childhood bedroom, because he does have _some_ boundaries, even when it came to a pretty face. 

Shelton regards him with those, huge, heavy lidded eyes, chin tilted up as a smile spreads across his bruised face. “You don’t know me.” He murmurs. “I’m a stranger.”

“Ain’t nobody a stranger after you clean blood of their face.” Eugene replies brusquely, and Shelton’s smile grows. “And you look like you need ya rest.”

“I do.” Shelton admits, and turns his gaze to the dark, empty room. His expression melts into something more serious, almost a little melancholy, “That I do.”

They part ways to sleep, but Eugene finds himself lying awake long after he has snuffed the lamps out, even with Sally’s warm body asleep at his feet. Turning Shelton over in his head for long enough that he begins to doze, slipping away into strange, confusing dreams in which a cowboy grabs his face and whispers, _Save me_ into his open mouth.

\------

Eugene finds Shelton shirtless and smoking on the porch after he is showered and dressed, ready to face the morning. Shelton looks distinctly unready for the day that is only just beginning: his curls stick up wild from his head, blood and sweat undoubtedly leaving it unruly. Eugene does everything he can to not look at the crease of Shelton’s stomach from where he’s sitting, or the dark hair leading away into his pants. It’s easy once his eyes find the deep purple bruise already beginning to spread across Shelton’s side, so huge that it’s no wonder he was struggling to move last night. 

“Jesus,” Eugene murmurs, “That bruise.”

“I toldja I only got one shirt.” Shelton says, voice still sleep-husky, and Eugene tips the brim of his hat over his face so Shelton can’t see his expression. 

Shelton is eyeing up Eugene as he sits to pull his boots on, Eugene can feel his eyes on the side of his head like they could burn right through. He can feel his face growing hot, and hopes that the sun is too bright for Shelton to notice, squinting in the light. His face is half hidden by his hand as though frozen on bringing his cigarette to his mouth; it’s smoking away into the air between them. He makes no move to swipe it away.

“Evidently.” Eugene mutters, glancing as he feels the bench creak under the two of them, only to get a good show of Shelton stretching. He’s not muscular, far too on the wiry side for any kinda weight to his strength, but he can see where it lies beneath that summer dark skin. “You ever done ranch work?” He asks, watching the play of muscles in Shelton’s back as he leans forward over his knees. The bruise is malignant. Eugene can only imagine the pain.

He shrugs. “Some.” His eyes are trained on the horizon, that alluring, vast horizon. “I’d learn anythin’ if I could keep a bed here for a few days.” He glances sidelong at Eugene, “Just until I figure somethin’ out.”

“Nothin’ too hard, with that side of yours.” Eugene begins, but is interrupted by Shelton waving his hand, dismissive. 

“Nah, I’ll do anythin’. ‘S not everyday someone lets a stranger into their house outta the goodness of their heart, ‘s gotta be repayed.” He runs his fingers through his tangled curls, and nods to himself. “I can turn my hand to anythin’.”

There is still something which doesn’t settle quite right about Shelton, but Eugene is just enamoured enough and just dead tired enough of running a ranch alone, that he allows it. Even loans Shelton his shower, and a nice clean shirt with no bloodstains on it at all. 

“Now you’re lookin’ a little bit less like trouble.” Eugene murmurs, pleased, as Shelton rolls the sleeves of his newly acquired shirt up over strong forearms. He looks good in Eugene’s clothes, looks good standing in Eugene’s kitchen, less like the foreign object he was last night. It’s almost comfortable. 

Shelton laughs, a real one. “Speak for yourself.” He looks up, amusement in those big eyes, and tucks his hands into the pockets of his jeans. “Alright, put me to work then.”

Shelton is beyond competent with his hands, even if he tends towards laziness as the afternoon wears on and becomes hotter and hotter. Eugene finds he can rely on him for most things: he knows little about ranching but a lot about the practical things. Mending fences, pasture maintenance, cutting hay. It lightens up the workload enough that Eugene finds himself truly enjoying his days for the first time in a long while. Being on horseback under the beating sun has never felt so good, and he has to put it down to the company. Throughout the week, Shelton seems to unwind a little, a sense of camaraderie growing between them. He doesn’t lose his sharp tongue, and he’s quick to temper, but seems to only like Eugene _more_ after they argue.

“What’s bringin’ you all the way up here, then?” Eugene asks him one afternoon, after the two of them had dismounted their horses for a quick lunch break. The patch of grass they have found is dry, and spiky, but Eugene lays down on it all the same. Anything to soothe the ache of his lower back, his thighs, from being in the saddle all morning. 

Shelton takes a bite of his sandwich, sat up on an uncomfortable looking boulder as he surveys the land around them. “Dontcha think it’s a beautiful country?” He asks, crumbs down the front of his shirt - Eugene’s shirt. 

“Sure,” Eugene says, “‘S that the draw?” He knows he’s pressing him for information, but it’s been well over a week and he knows little more than he did when Shelton first showed up. He knows he’s the youngest of seven, that he’s from Louisiana, and that he hasn’t been home in ten years. Tiny little dropped details, and Eugene tucks them away like they’re something precious. He’s cagey, and Eugene wants to know why.

“God’s own country.” Shelton murmurs, eyes faraway, as though he isn’t even hearing Eugene. “You ever think that?”

They drink whiskey that night, on the front porch, slapping mosquitos on their bare arms and trading a cigarette back a forth like teens. Shelton had found it, of course, tucked away at the back of the pantry while he hunted for porridge. 

“Hey,” He’d said, voice low and impressed. “This is good stuff.”

The flickering gas lamp behind his head lights his curls angelic. A halo. The cut above his eye is healing nicely; after a few drinks he permits Eugene to touch it. It feels like the first night, again. That overwhelming allure he had had back then hasn’t faded, and so Eugene feels like he’s holding his breath as he swipes his thumb over the raised, healing wound. Shelton slides lower in his seat, parts his legs just enough for Eugene to notice.

He pours them both a neat measure of whiskey and downs his in one to keep his hands busy. The air is so dry he feels suffocated; the heat, the dust, Shelton’s larger than life presence. This is why he chose to live alone. This is why it was just him, the horse, the cattle, God.

“You ever want somethin’ more?” Shelton asks, then. His voice is pensive, and when Eugene glances his way, his eyes are fixed once more on the horizon. He understands the draw of it: sometimes it feels like he can see to the edge of the world from this porch seat. Like what he sees is all there is to the world. The thought is as comforting as it is terrifying. 

“Who doesn’t?” He replies, unable to tear his eyes away from Shelton’s profile. The lamplight is picking him out in shades of bronze and gold; the full pout of his lips, the hard wedge of nose to offset the softness of his brow. The bruises are beginning to melt away, yellowing until they’re barely there, save for his still-dark eyes. Eugene has never wanted like he wants now. He knows he’s part way to drunk, which means part way to reckless, but the feeling is a tough one to beat down tonight. “Do you?”

The sounds of the nighttime prairie bloom between them in the silence that follows. It feels very much like that first night, that night where Shelton tumbled into his life. 

“I’m always wantin’ somethin’ more.” Shelton says, and the way his eyes slide over Eugene tells him all he needs to know. The whiskey feels heavy on his tongue; he fumbles for his cigarettes for something to do, anything to dodge the weight of that gaze. Shelton’s knee knocks against his own, and Eugene watches, frozen, as he drains the rest of his whiskey. “Runnin’ all the time keeps you from what you could have as easy as anythin’.” He’s drunk, Eugene realises dimly. Far drunker than Eugene is, judging by the way his eyes settle on Eugene, unseeing and intense all at once. “What do ya _want_ , Gene?”

His voice has dropped low, husky. Eugene can feel his heart hammering in his chest, just as plain as Shelton’s knee against his own. “I can’t say.” He says, mouth moving of its own accord. His hands feel clammy, and he fumbles with the matches until Shelton leans forward and strikes one for him. His face is ghoulish in the sharp, short flare of light that comes with it, those eyes in shadow. Then the flame is snuffed and he is Shelton again, nothing hiding within.

Eugene is drunk and he is hot from his cheeks down to the very pit of his stomach. It feels as bad as it feels good, because God’s eye is stronger outside the four walls of the chapel, and Shelton doesn’t know that. Everything within him is chanting _be careful, be careful, be careful_ but it’s been drowned out by the rush of blood in his ears as Shelton takes his cigarette and puts it between his lips and-

“I can’t say neither.” Shelton murmurs, sly, and a grin slides drunken across his face. The tip of his nose is burned from their long day in the sun, and it makes him look more impish than ever. Especially with that grin, all teeth, no humour. It strikes Eugene that Shelton _knows_ , and that is enough to have him stumbling to his feet, swiping a hand over his face like he can erase this whole drunken mess. 

“I’m goin’ to bed.” He mutters, hand clutched in his hair. Shelton is watching him, that sharp, humourless grin still on his face. “We can’t-”

He didn’t even say his prayers that night, too drunk and too ashamed to even try. The sensation of Shelton’s face under his palm still lingers, tingling its way to the tips of his fingers. Drunkenly, he presses his hand to the front of his underwear, where he’s been hard since Shelton had parted his thighs at the touch of Eugene’s hand to his face. He can’t stop the buzz of images in his mind, the dark hair on Shelton’s stomach, his strong hands, the flex of wiry muscles in his arms and the way his thighs look in his worn out jeans. He imagines Shelton spread out beneath him, his thumb between those lips, and has to turn his face into his pillow to muffle the noise the fantasy rips from him. 

He hears the creak of floorboards in the kitchen; Shelton coming in from his final cigarette outside, and for some reason it’s enough to send him over the edge. He spills over his hand, fucking up into the tight ring he made as he listens to Sheldon’s footsteps through his door. It makes him feel filthy, bone deep dirty as soon as he comes down from his orgasm. But his head is spinning with liquor and arousal and post-orgasm lethargy, and he is slipping into sleep before he can even register what he’s done.

\------

“You’re ruinin’ my life.” Eugene deadpans, watching Shelton cross the kitchen to the bathroom, towel thrown over his shoulder. He looks as bad as Eugene feels, which is pretty goddamn bad, and that’s the only small victory that Eugene can find here.

“Nobody made you drink that much.” Shelton says, lightly, but his grin is mocking when he levels it Eugene’s way. Half formed memories of fingers in mouths and hands clenched tight in curls drift through Eugene’s mind, and he focuses his attention back in on his coffee rather than Shelton bare chested and tempting in his kitchen. “Get some sun on ya face, you’ll feel better.”

“If I get on a horse I will vomit.” He mutters darkly, and Shelton just snorts before he disappears into the bathroom. A few moments later, Eugene hears the shower sputter to life. Incapable of being that close to Shelton’s naked, wet body, Eugene takes his coffee and his pity outside on the porch.

It’s all gone south. Literally. Figuratively. He can’t look Shelton in the eye properly, anymore. He’ll catch onto it soon enough; it didn’t take a scientist to put together the energy on the porch last night, Eugene’s hasty retreat to bed, and the air of shame around the house this morning. His resolve is slipping. Shelton has been staying with him for only a handful of weeks, and it’s slipped this far. He’s trouble, and Eugene had sniffed that out from the start, but had been too weak to do anything about it. 

For the next few days, Eugene throws himself headfirst into work around the ranch. He fixes the leaky barn roof, a job he’d been putting off for months, and takes off alone most mornings to check the herd, check the pastures and the fences. The drought is stretching longer and longer, so end in sight, so he and Shelton move the herd to a pasture for better grazing, for now. In the evenings, he sits on the porch and watches the sky and waits for the rains to come. 

He’s doing just that after a long hot afternoon of chopping wood, something which should have been Shelton’s job, only he had been laying low for most of the week. His arms ache, his wrists, and the new lines of blisters coming up on his palms are burning as he sweats. All together, a rough day. The morning had brought with it a very sick calf that Eugene isn’t sure will last the week, and he hates seeing them die for reasons beyond the financial. 

He takes a swig of the beer, the cool bottle sweating in the late heat of the day. It’s cool on his blisters, soothing, so he holds it for a while, watches the horizon and breathes. He’s exhausted, his head full of cotton, and that’s the only thing keeping him from being madder at Shelton. He couldn’t muster it to be annoyed about him shirking work. 

A shadow falls across him, and when Eugene glances from the horizon, Shelton is standing in front of him, blocking out the low sun. They regard each other silently, and then Shelton tips his hat back with his thumb and grins.

“That beer?”

Eugene grits his teeth. “It is if you’d been out choppin’ firewood for the winter all afternoon like I have.” He can’t hide the grumpiness in his voice, and Shelton’s smile just sharpens in response. 

“It’s August.” He says, and Eugene lets him brush by him into the house anyway: he’s too tired to really be annoyed. 

Snafu emerges in a t-shirt with his own bottle, which he knocks against Eugene’s shoulder before he settles in next to him on the step. He takes a swig, wipes his mouth, and knocks his elbow into Eugene’s side.

“I was branding the calves all afternoon, actually.” His grin is smug now, because he enjoys being one step ahead of Eugene, and Eugene knows that. 

Eugene’s so surprised for a second that he’s silent. “I didn’t ask you to do that.” He says. 

Shelton shrugs, that smile stretching as he closes his eyes and tips his face towards the sun. “I know.” He says, “Jus’ like I know you’re too tender for it.”

Eugene is speechless, shocked at how easily Shelton had read him. “How d’you figure that?”

Shelton throws him a sidelong look which is all too familiar, all too knowing. “You got an old, half-lame horse ‘round here jus’ for the fun of it?”

Eugene just scoffs, doesn’t reply, but Shelton’s shoulder is pressed up against his and he doesn’t go to move. The feeling of being seen is new and novel, lighting him up all warm under his ribcage. It’s affectionate, it’s borderline _romantic_ , which is an odd way to view the branding of calves but Eugene chooses to look beyond that. Shelton doing things for him. He tries to hide a smile behind the lip of his beer bottle, but Shelton glances to the side just as he does and catches it.

“You’re goin’ fuckin’ soft.” He murmurs, but his tone was affectionate, warm. Eugene flushes under the weight of that, holding his cool beer bottle to his burning cheek to stave the blush off.

\-------

Eugene is kneading dough when Shelton joins him in the kitchen, hands in his pockets and head dipped as he comes to slouch against the counter nearby. Eugene pays him no mind, attention half on the radio, and half on the dough he’s working on. It’s a companionable silence, besides, with the drone of the news set against the background noises of the ranch. Shelton turns the faucet for him when it’s time to rinse his hands, to stop the knobs getting dirty, and grins down at him when Eugene thanks him.

“What a gentleman.” Eugene says, teasing, glancing up at Snafu as he dries his hands. He’s handsome by the light of the kitchen; his olive skin deepened by the sun of the last few weeks. The mark above his brow is barely anything, now, and if Eugene had thought he was handsome then he is beautiful now. 

“I live to treat you good.” He murmurs, those heavy lidded, hypnotic eyes trained on Eugene through the low light. He’s not kidding, but the corner of his mouth lifts a fraction, and he shifts his stance, turns to catch Eugene’s wrist as he moves past him. 

His hand is hot around Eugene’s wrist, big and square and rough, worker’s hands. Eugene stares down at it, swallows down the lump of sudden, blinding anxiety in his throat, and tilts his head to meet Shelton’s eyes. They share a long, loaded look of understanding, and then Shelton pulls Eugene to his chest, and puts his lips to his. 

It’s been building since Eugene had cleaned his poor, handsome face during that strange, liminal first night. All the long rides together, the lunch breaks, the beers the coffees the shared cigarettes. Everything was a brick on the road that led to this: kissing by the flickering lamplight in Eugene’s kitchen, Eugene is pliant against Shelton, who holds him so gently he’s sure he mightt choke on the emotion rising in his chest. He brings a hand to Shelton’s chest, slipping to the nape of his neck as he deepens the kiss, presses harder against him. He’s smaller than Eugene had considered; slim and wiry under his hands, making it so much easier for the clumsy push and pull to Eugene’s bedroom. 

The night slips away, the long, hard day forgotten as Eugene presses Shelton down into his mattress. Afterwards, they sleep, bare skin to bare skin, Eugene’s cheek pressed against the thump of Shelton’s heart beneath his ribcage.

\--------

Eugene wakes to find an empty bed and an even emptier house. It’s disheartening, but he doesn’t let himself be dragged in by it. Shelton is an early riser, and early smoker. It would’ve been nice to wake up next to him after their night together, but perhaps Eugene was having delusions about the nature of their relationship. He was prone to it; a habitual romantic, and an even worse overthinker. 

It isn’t Eugene’s first time, with a man or otherwise. It’s his first time with a man who he knows, a who he’ll be seeing the day after and every day after _that_. Perhaps it’s that what is getting his head all twisted around about the empty bed this morning, or perhaps he really likes Shelton and just isn’t ready to face that head on just yet. He feels heartsick, but knows better than to mope. He showers off the sweat from last night, and heads out to do his daily duties around the ranch.

Afternoon finds him at his wits end with nothing to do but return to the bread he had been interrupted from making last night. He pokes at the sad dough, a little hard, the rise completely deflated. “Start over.” He murmurs, originally to Sally before realising she must have followed Shelton out on whatever adventure he was on that day. Feeling truly _lonely_ for the first time in as long as he can remember, he goes diving in the pantry for ingredients, only to find they were all out of flour.

He stands in the kitchen for a moment, weighing the empty container of flour as he tries to find a way to avoid driving all the way into town for groceries. Nothing comes to mind; he’ll have to bite the bullet and do it. Besides, they had run clean out of coffee a couple days ago, and Eugene isn’t ready to face Shelton under those circumstances at all.

The truck is in the driveway, which means Shelton is out on horseback, which is lucky for Eugene. Or not, depending on badly he wanted to _not_ do this chore. He loads into the truck, turning the keys in the ignition a couple times to coax the engine to life, gentle as a lover. Then he sets off, letting the ranch drop away behind him.

He thumps the dashboard in time to whatever country music is playing out over the radio, something upbeat and real twangy. It’s almost enough to lift his mood a little, enough to convince him he’s acting stupid about waking up along that morning. Idiocy. Shelton is finally doing his _job_ around the ranch, and Eugene can’t go messing that up just because he wants him as a bed warmer for a few mornings until the novelty wears off. It leaves a vaguely warm feeling in his chest to know that Shelton is out there working, anyway. It feels very much like he’s beginning to succeed in slowly taming some undomesticated, stubborn animal. 

The drive into town is easy, and Eugene lingers in the grocery store, pondering over what he could cook for dinner that night. He’s not a fantastic chef, but Shelton _is_ , surprisingly. It makes Eugene want to make something good for him, in return. Especially since Shelton has presumably been doing work all day while Eugene slacked off and wandered around town. His mind is full of him, and so blessedly absent of any guilt or shame that Eugene lets himself revel in it. They way Shelton had kissed him, had touched him. The way he looked under Eugene - whatever he’d dreamt up before had been a pale imitation of the real thing. 

The way he’s wandering around with his head in the clouds makes it all the more shocking as he walks past a storefront, and a movement catches his eye. It’s a poster, half unstuck from the glass and flapping in the breeze. Eugene half-turns, not meaning to give it any mind, until his eyes catch on a familiar curl of a lip and he pulls up short.

Dread is a stone in his stomach. Slowly, he reaches out to smooth the poster flat, and as soon as he sees the bold _WANTED_ emblazoned across the top, he tears it from the storefront, stuffing it into his pocket before picking up a fast pace back to the truck. His mind is running on pure instinct, and he practically throws the bags of groceries into the hot cab of the truck, slamming the door behind him as he fumbles for the piece of paper he had stuffed away.

It had torn halfway through the middle in his haste to snatch it from the window, but he doesn’t need to line the two halves up to recognise the face scowling back at him from the paper. His mind is blank with shock, his hands cold despite the heat. _WANTED: Merriell ‘SNAFU’ Shelton. Theft. Assault. Evading Arrest._

It feels like he has been knocked over the head with a shovel. It’s unmistakable, there’s no way around it. Shelton’s face stares back at him, that cocky little curl to his lip above the charges, the _bounty_. Eugene feels sick. With numb hands, he jams the keys into the ignition, cursing at it as the engine sputters a few times before finally turning over. The drive back is a blur, the truck bouncing over potholes and jolting over the uneven track to the ranch. Eugene barely notices. The only thing in his head is confronting Shelton, playing over and over the scene. He hopes Shelton would throw his head back and laugh, declare it all a joke, but his heart is sinking in his chest as he begins to pick apart his own fantasies. The mysterious circumstances of Shelton’s arrival? The fact that Shelton had apparently been robbed, but not of his horse, or anything else important? 

Eugene had let a felon into his home, into his _bed_. He had trusted him, drank with him, _fucked_ him, slept with his head on his chest. He’s a fool, and this felt like the ultimate penance. He can practically feel God’s eye on him already, burning through the roof of his car as he races to fix his sins. 

Shelton is sprawled on porch steps when Eugene pulls up to the house, soaking in the low afternoon sun with the dog curled at his feet. There’s a mug in his hand, the chipped yellow one he always favoured, and Eugene figures it holds whiskey, judging by the silly smile that spills across Shelton’s face as watches Eugene get out of the truck.

His grin widens, “Hey su-”

Before he can finish his sentence, Eugene throws the balled up poster at his chest. His hands catch it, reflexively, and begin to unfold it as Eugene spits, “When were you gonna tell me you’re a _wanted criminal_ , Shelton? Before or after I fucked you?”

Shelton has smoothed out the flimsy, torn paper, and any trace of humour has melted from his face. “After, I guess.” He mutters, taking a stab at facetious. It doesn’t land. Eugene crosses his arms over his chest, waiting. The anger is ebbing and flowing within him, alongside betrayal, _hurt_. He needs to keep the anger at the crest of the wave, he knows that. “Gene,” Shelton’s tone is steely now, and he’s staring down at the paper like it holds the secrets to the universe. “I was gonna tell ya.”

“Oh yeah?” Eugene snaps, and the look on Shelton’s face makes him stop in his tracks. He’s never seen him look so serious.

“I _was_.” Shelton murmurs, lifting his eyes from the paper to meet Eugene’s. “It was just never the right time.”

“Maybe the right time was right before you _lied_ to me?” Eugene counters with, but the venom is ebbing from his words. His anger wave is cresting; he’d never thought Shelton could look so damn hurt. “How could you do that?” He says, “Was everything else a lie?”

Shelton stands, then, as if he can convey how fully he means what he says next by that. “No.” He says, tone final. “Even my lie was,” He casts around, brow crumpling. “A _half_ lie. I _did_ get beaten. I _did_ need shelter.”

“Yeah, to lay low from the Sheriff and his men! What, you got those injuries escapin’?” The hurt is creeping in now. The desperation to understand, to make sense of how he could feel like this for someone he apparently barely knew.

“I lied about being robbed, the rest was real, Gene.” Shelton is beginning to sound upset, something even more troubling and unfamiliar. Jesus, Eugene is weak to him. His anger wave crests, and breaks against the shore. “Everything I said to you, everything we did, that shit was real.”

“Then what’s the truth?” Eugene says, voice small. 

Shelton closes his eyes and half turns away, pressing his fingers into his eye sockets until he groans and bites out. “I was fuckin’ afraid, is that what you wanna hear? I thought they was gonna fuckin’ kill me for bein’ a queer. I didn’t steal nothin’, they picked me up and started beatin’ on me - when I fought back, that’s when it all became a big fuckin’ problem.” He doesn’t take his hands from his face, his body still turned away, as though he were embarrassed. “I saw your ranch when I was ridin’ hard to just _get away_ , and figured it was worth a shot.”

“What would you have done if I didn’t let you in?” Eugene asks, slow, and Shelton looks away, and shrugs. 

“I woulda done what I woulda had to do, probably.” He mutters, and despite the implication, Eugene feels better for the raw honesty in his voice. Embarrassment is stewing under his breastbone, mingling with the lingering adrenaline from all that anger inside him. His head is a mess. Is he really that susceptible to a pretty face? Shelton had made a fool outta him, right?

“Did you fuck me so you could stay here longer?” He asks, and as soon as it was out of his mouth, he regrets it. He doesn’t _want_ to hear the answer, but knows he needs to hear it. He knows Shelton wouldn’t lie to him, not now.

Shelton steps forward, wary, like Eugene is a dog who is fit to bite. “No.” He murmurs, touching his hand to Eugene’s elbow, his arms still crossed tight around his chest. “It never crossed my mind.” 

Eugene uncurls towards him, a plant towards light. “Really?” He asks, and the anger is long gone now, replaced by bone deep hurt. “You ain’t lying?”

“No more lyin’.” Shelton says, and takes Eugene’s hand in his own. The evening has turned humid, suffocating in its own right, but it’s Shelton’s hand in his that’s making it hard to pull in air. Eugene can feel himself sweating in the soupy air, can see it glistening on Shelton’s throat, past the open V of his button up. He can’t make himself move to go inside, into the cool of the house. Shelton’s gaze has him rooted to the ground. “You gotta understand. I lied to save my own ass,” His eyes flick over Eugene’s face, searching. “You know what it’s like to have to keep a secret.”

“You lie if you have to.” Eugene murmurs, and his heart feels full and absolute in his chest. It’s sadness, it’s affection, it’s plain betrayal that he knows will take time to edge past. 

\------

Eugene sleeps alone that night, a shallow and fitful half-sleep that has him waking at any sound; the creak of a floorboard, the shutters banging as the wind picked up. The possibility of Shelton lying awake too, just a room away, keeps him awake, keeps his brain ticking over. 

Is he wrong to stay angry at him? Is he wrong to forgive him? The two questions swirl around his head, leaving him to toss and turn fitfully in bed for most of the night. It could’ve been anyone, it could’ve been _him_. The room is too hot, the night too heavy and humid; he shoves the covers back off himself, wishing that Shelton was here next to him. To talk, to argue some more, whatever. There’s a creeping feeling beginning to rise within him, something like fear for something he’d never considered before. _That could’ve been him_. He presses his hand over his eyes, and in the darkness sees Shelton’s split lip, the gash above his eyes, the bruises on his jaw. 

He must have dozed, because the next thing he’s aware of is a hammering like tiny stones on the roof of the house. It takes a second for his sleep addled brain to catch up to the rest of the world around him, and he realises that it’s _raining_. He springs out of bed, all thoughts of last night forgotten as he tears the curtains back from the window and stares off across his land, sees the rain driving down from the sky. 

“Thank God.” He breathes, hands fisted in the drapes. No more moving the herd to increasingly drier pastures in search of food, no more worrying and watching the skies. He’s so elated and concentrated on the rain that he almost misses the shine of lamplight from the stables, glinting off the puddles forming in the hard, dry ground. He frowns, squinting through the darkness and the rain to try and make it out. He has a bad feeling in his gut about it, so he taps Sally on the side, and the two of them head into the downpour towards the mysterious light in the stables. 

The rain is torrential, soaking Eugene through to the skin in his thin nightclothes almost immediately. Sally pays it no mind, rushing ahead to the stables, leaving Eugene to splash along behind her. She lingers at the doorway, pushing her nose through the door, and then Eugene sees her tail wag once, and she disappears inside. His nerves settle. It must just be Shelton. 

In the stable. In the middle of a downpour, in the middle of the night. His nerves spike again; he wishes he’d brought a lamp with him to light his way.

He peers around the doorway, and sees Shelton lit by the flickering oil lamp, drenched with rain and intent on tightening the saddle of the horse he had ridden in on. Eugene’s heart drops. He had suspected it, buried deep in the back of his mind as soon as he had seen that light. Having it confirmed felt far worse than the niggling fear. 

“What are you doing?” He asks, raising his voice a little to be heard over the drumming rain on the roof of the stable. Shelton doesn’t reply, and Sally is nudging her nose into his thigh, so it’s obvious that Eugene’s element of surprise had been foiled. He’d thought maybe if he shocked him, snuck up on him, he may catch Shelton off his guard for once. It’s obvious that he won’t have any such luck with it, judging by the stiff set of Shelton’s shoulders, the way he’s resolutely avoiding making eye contact with Eugene. His eyes are downcast, hat tipped low to conceal his expression. He’s seemingly absorbed in the straps of the saddle, but Eugene knows he’s just messing around to avoid conversation. He spots the gun on Shelton’s hip, the saddlebags half hidden by Shelton’s body, and his heart sinks lower.

“Please don’t leave.” He says, shutting the stable door behind him. He steps forward into the pool of light cast by Shelton’s lamp, swiping his wet hair back off his face to keep it from dripping into his eyes. 

“I’ve gotta.” Shelton replies, voice low and barely loud enough to hear over the rain thundering down over their heads. His wet hands slip on the leather as he tries to buckle it, until he gives up and throws it away from him with a grunt. The horse shifts, trotting away a few paces, a little spooked. 

“Why?” Eugene asks, and Shelton pulls his hat from his head, knots his fingers in his hair. He’s still avoiding eye contact, but Eugene can’t help but think his eyes are bloodshot, watery.

His voice is tight with some inexpressible emotion when he speaks. “I can’t trust ya.” 

The words fall awkwardly into the long silence that follows. Shelton’s curls are wild, drying and frizzing in the humidity. He sets his hat back on, and goes back to the stubborn buckle on the saddle, like he hadn’t said anything, like Eugene’s mind wasn’t blank with hurt. 

“Don’t end somethin’ that ain’t even had time to start.” He says, something nameless rising in his throat and behind his eyes. “We can work somethin’ out.” Shelton glances his way, and Eugene latches onto it, that moment of interest. “I mean, it’s fuckin’ rainin’, Shelton. You don’t think that’s a sign? A goddamn miracle?” 

Shelton’s damp hands slip again on the leather he’d been fumbling with, and this time he hangs his head, and sighs. Eugene watches his broad, straight shoulders rise with the inhale he takes, and he braces himself for what he could say next. Shelton, with his sharp tongue. He’s afraid, he realises. So close to letting slip through his fingers the only thing that had interrupted his motony for the better. He can’t imagine what his life would be like if he let Shelton leave from it now; he would retreat into himself, away from the world. Loneliness is already settling into him, as though in preparation of what Shelton chose to say next.

“You’re a stupid bastard.” He mutters, and Eugene stands in frozen surprise for a second, processing that. Then Shelton takes his hat off, lays it over the pommel of the saddle, and Eugene crosses the last few feet between them. He meets him just as Shelton holds his arms open for him. “You stupid, stupid bastard.” Shelton mumbles into his neck, squeezing him tight against his body. Eugene grins into his curls, breathing in that familiar scent he always had. 

“For you.” He replies, and Shelton just pulls him down to kiss him, his hand fisted securely in the rain-wet fabric of Eugene’s shirt.

**Author's Note:**

> thanks for reading!


End file.
